The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (84) Trooper Norman Charles Dyer, 10th Light Horse Regiment, AIF, First World War.

The Last Post Ceremony is presented in the Commemorative area of the Australian War Memorial each day. The ceremony commemorates more than 102,000 Australians who have given their lives in war and other operations and whose names are recorded on the Roll of Honour. At each ceremony the story behind one of the names on the Roll of Honour is told. Hosted by Chris Widenbar, the story for this day was on (84) Trooper Norman Charles Dyer, 10th Light Horse Regiment, AIF, First World War.

84 Trooper Norman Charles Dyer, 10th Light Horse Regiment, AIF
KIA 7 August 1915
Photograph: H06647

Story delivered 7 August 2017

Today we remember and pay tribute to Trooper Norman Charles Dyer.

Norman Dyer was born in 1889, one of ten children of Charles and Elizabeth Dyer of Booleroo Centre in South Australia’s Flinders Ranges. After attending state school, and then Muirden College in Adelaide, Norman moved to Kellerberrin on the Western Australian wheat belt and worked on the family property of “Holmbush”.

Dyer enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force just weeks after the outbreak of war, travelling to Perth to sign on at the light horse training camp at Guilford. After four months of training, he sailed for Egypt as an original member of the 10th Light Horse Regiment. While the infantry then in camp in Egypt embarked for the fighting in the Dardanelles in early April, the light horse remained in camp and trained for future offensive action.

The 10th Light Horse was sent to Gallipoli as reinforcements following the failure of the landing and the heavy casualties within the Australian and New Zealand forces. The steep terrain and static nature of fighting on Gallipoli prevented mounted units from participating in their intended role, but the 10th Light Horse Regiment and the rest of the 3rd Light Horse Brigade were sent to Gallipoli in late May as dismounted infantry to help defend the Anzac positions. This they did in the area around Walker’s Ridge through June and July, until they were ultimately drawn into the allied attempt to break out of the beach head in what became known as the August Offensive.

Beginning on 7 August 1915, the offensive called for a series of synchronised attacks along the Anzac positions. Feints took place at Lone Pine in the south and the Nek in the north in an attempt to draw Ottoman reinforcements away from the main thrust and capture the heights of the Sari Bair Range.

That day, the 3rd Light Horse Brigade made its ill-fated assault at the Nek – a narrow stretch of ground where Ottoman positions were barely 30 metres from the Australian trenches.

Despite a bombardment that failed to destroy Ottoman machine-guns covering the area, the light horsemen charged the Ottoman positions in successive waves, met by a fusillade of rifle and machine-gun fire, cut down barely 10 metres from their own parapet. The 10th Light Horse charged at the Nek after two waves from the 8th Light Horse had been decimated before them. In less than 15 minutes, 230 Australian troops had been killed attempting to rush the Ottoman trenches.

Witnesses last saw Norman Dyer jumping the parapet and rushing into no man’s land at the Nek. Despite later reports that he had been seen in hospital, Red Cross searchers found no trace of him in Egypt or Malta. Not knowing whether her brother was dead or alive, Norman’s sister Madeline wrote to the Defence Department seeking information. “Can you unfathom this mystery for us?” she wrote in October 1915. “Uncertainty and suspense is worse than the blow”. Without further news of his whereabouts, Norman remained missing in action until a court of inquiry held in January 1916 determined that he had been killed in action on 7 August.

Aged 26 at the time of his death, Norman’s body was never recovered from the battlefield. Today his name is listed on the Lone Pine Memorial, alongside 5,000 Australian and New Zealand soldiers who died on Gallipoli and have no known grave.

His name is listed on the Roll of Honour on my right, among more than 60,000 Australians who died while serving in the First World War.

This is but one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Trooper Norman Charles Dyer, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

Aaron Pegram
Historian, Military History Section